After The Pandemic - Smith: The End of the World (10) Conclusion, or, The End of the End of the World. (1447 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: After_the_Pandemic Smith
Rating: 1.97 on 38 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by Jack McCallum (View user info) at 2005-09-01 17:12:28 EDT
Related Tales...
ATP - Intro http://www.ubersite.com/m/61238
ATP - Background
-Corrigan http://www.ubersite.com/m/61296
-Variant C http://www.ubersite.com/m/61350
ATP - Smith tales
-Archangels 1 http://www.ubersite.com/m/61513
-Archangels 2 http://www.ubersite.com/m/61755
-Archangels 3 http://www.ubersite.com/m/61985
-Archangels 4 http://www.ubersite.com/m/62289
-Archangels 5 http://www.ubersite.com/m/62570
-Smith in D.C. http://www.ubersite.com/m/64167
-Smith at Sea http://www.ubersite.com/m/64857
-Smith: The End of the World (1) http://www.ubersite.com/m/66658
-Smith: The End of the World (2) http://www.ubersite.com/m/68176
-Smith: The End of the World (3) http://www.ubersite.com/m/69626
-Smith: The End of the World (4) http://www.ubersite.com/m/69714
-Smith: The End of the World (5) http://www.ubersite.com/m/69802
-Smith: The End of the World (6) http://www.ubersite.com/m/71864
-Smith: The End of the World (7) http://www.ubersite.com/m/72036
-Smith: The End of the World (8) http://www.ubersite.com/m/73371
-Smith: The End of the World (9) http://www.ubersite.com/m/73934
=(10)=
NINE YEARS LATER...
Sails snapped and sea-spray saturated the air with the scent of salt.
The ship was sturdy, wide, the hull round and packed with goods, a belly full of food. Two masts bore patchwork canvas sails, and a flag. The flag was a field of pale blue, the light of day, and a mixture of symbols. Among them were an eagle, a lion, a bear, a maple leaf, and many stars, some forming constellations. The symbols represented many countries and nationalities no longer in existence.
Smith still hated the water, but he stood near the bow of the ship holding on to a line to steady himself. He was a living map of the struggle against the children of the Pandemic, the battle against leech and muncher which went on still, far to the north.
He was holding onto the line to stop from falling on his ass. On solid ground he walked with a sturdy cane of solid oak that had burst open more than one skull over the years. His left leg was half-hidden in a brace of metal struts, the bones once terribly shattered, healing having begun before they could be properly set. He was now missing two fingers on his left hand. He had more scars on his face, the patch of white hair above the worst of those scars a little wider now. He wore a black patch over his right eye. Sometimes when he caught his reflection in a piece of glass or metal he missed the unscathed boy who had escaped from the leech laboratory decades ago, but Smith had little time for wistful thoughts. One look at Trina, still so beautiful, and he knew he would bear the brunt of any assault to leave her safe.
Smith was watching the horizon. He was not alone.
A small boy stood beside him and not for the first time asked, "Are we there yet?"
Smith shook his head. "No. And hold tight to that line. People fall overboard all the time, doesn't matter if they are seven or seventy."
The boy looked up at Smith and squinted. "How old are you?"
"Old enough to know better," Smith muttered. "Not old enough to have learned any better."
The boy sighed, ignoring the warning and using both hands to shield his eyes, his body moving in perfect time with the ship. The sun was past noon and glimmering on the blue waves west of the ship, waves that seemed to go on forever.
Smith envied the boy's ease, but it was nothing out of the ordinary for a child who had lived most of his life at sea.
A voice was raised in alarm behind them.
"Corrigan Klozy Smith! What do you think you are doing?"
The man and the boy shared identical expressions of guilt.
"Now you've done it," Smith whispered.
"Sorry, dad," the boy replied.
*
Smith had been hailed as a hero after the sun bomb had gone off. He considered Stewart and the hard-fighting, very mortal Scots the heroes, and make that point clear.
The leeches exposed to the light of the sun bombs, which had detonated one after another in the Britains and the Americas, lighting up the night and instantly becoming the stuff of legend, died horrific deaths.
They burned. They did not burst into flames or explode. Reality was far less dramatic, and far more painful. The leeches were seared, left helpless, blind, screaming crusts waiting to be put down. The burns ran deep, into the fabric of the matter that made them, a sickness from which they could not recover.
Smith and Trina had hidden in the shadows of the palace as the light burned overhead. He held her tight and told her everything would be okay even as smoke seeped from his ruined eye.
James Stewart had passed the word among his men, and all but a few of them took cover when the bomb went off. Those who sought darkness and shade escaped with bad sunburns. Those humans who did not escape the light were blinded and fermenting cancers without knowing it.
Leeches exposed to mere seconds of the light were dazzled and left reeling like drunks, easy targets to strike down, unaware that they were mortally weakened.
Munchers died slower, but the light reached more of them as they were always seeking food.
Leeches and munchers had been made by variations, mutations, in the same virus. It was the virus the light destroyed, and this was why even Trina had to take cover for hours. Smith felt ill for a few days after his exposure, but his one-of-a-kind immune system soon recovered.
The hungry no-longer-human races which arose with the Pandemic were nearly exterminated that night. They died in the millions on both sides of the Atlantic.
The sun bombs burned for hours, finally fading away in the rosy light of dawn.
The fight was not over, but now the numbers were even, and the hardened human resistance knew what they were fighting, unlike the confused early days of the Pandemic when the disease spread without limits and humanity scrambled to understand what was happening.
Smith and Trina were asked to stay and partake in that fight, and receive a share of the spoils afterward.
Smith declined, telling the Scots he had to move on, and when Stewart promised to help Smith in any way possible Smith said he needed only a ship, and access to sky pictures, the kind of pictures that were once taken by cameras up among the stars.
"What d'ye want with that, man?"
When Smith told him, Stewart laughed out loud.
The old Scot had taken Smith into a small, hidden room in the Palace. His men had discovered the place looking for hiding leeches. It was a storehouse of treasures. Gold. Silver. Precious gems, both loose, and set in gold. Working electrics.
Pillage.
The concentrated wealth reminded Stewart, who needed no reminders, how much the leeches had taken from his people, from the whole island.
"My ancestors were kings and queens of Scotland," Stewart had said softly. "They may have touched these things, once upon a time."
"I don't put much truck in gold," Smith had said. "It's heavy, and I get around on foot."
Stewart and Trina talked Smith into taking diamonds.
"You'll need them," Stewart had said. "Most of our people will ignore common sense and take precious goods over barter goods any day. A man can't eat diamonds, but you can use them to buy fruit. Grain. Seeds. A ship."
Stewart offered a sack full of glittering cut stones. Smith took what he could hold in one fist.
"You've got a war to wage, and a lot of rebuilding to do," Smith had said. "You'll need most of this."
Smith and Trina had left the castle, following the route Stewart had given them, walking down the High Street and turning south along the old George IV Bridge towards Edinburgh University.
From the Esplanade they had seen fires burning across the city, started by windows that had concentrated light and heat from the sun bomb.
Trina had asked, "Is that yours?"
Smith had looked down and laughed out loud. Pint was walking beside him like a well-heeled dog. He scooped up the orange tabby and put her on his shoulder. She licked his ear.
"Lucky her," Trina said.
*
Smith did gather a few followers along the way.
Two of Jim Stewart's sons, Alistair and Arthur, wanted to join in when they heard Smith's mad idea. They thought it would be a great adventure and were eager to set off that instant. They had no idea it would be years before they left the Britains. Smith welcomed them, two strong young men in their twenties who were both fearless and loyal would be an asset, but he took them along only after asking for the approval of their father. The old man hugged his youngest boys and wept, wishing they would stay on and help in the fight, but he understood that if things did not go well here, his family might live on elsewhere. The Stewart boys brought their wives along as well. The brothers had married cousins Anna and Alice. The woman had learned how to make small, hidden gardens go a long way, providing food as well as simple medicines in the form of herbs.
At the University the party encountered and subdued four meek leeches hiding in the dark bowels of the first big building they entered, leeches who said they were scientists and swore they were only interested in protecting and expanding knowledge, not feeding on humans.
"Do you share that knowledge with the humans," Smith had asked, "or just your fellow leeches?"
The leeches were damned by their guilty expressions.
When the leeches were disposed of Smith was relieved to find more than a dozen survivors who had been working for the leeches. Two of them were quislings and had to be put down. One was a very old man who had studied there in his youth. The man was frail, but very alert. He cried when hen learned of the uprising, and said he hoped he would live to see the day when science could be once again be studied for the benefit of all.
Smith had told them what he was looking for. They told him this part of the school was primarily concerned with medicine. The leeches had been trying to increase their strengths, and studying human nutrition and physiology so they could breed bigger, healthier food animals. The old man said all of his young charges had risked their lives more than once by allowed experiments to become tainted, the data useless. Smith was instructed to go south, to another part of the University, another campus.
They party was bigger by two more as they set out along Nicholson Street.
A man in his forties wanted to come along. His name was Neal. He was very fit, having studied nutrition, dentistry, and general medicine. He could pull teeth and set broken bones with ease.
Laura was ten years younger than Nigel. Forced by the leeches to assist in autopsies on survivors and procedures performed on leeches with severe injuries, she was the closest thing they would have to a surgeon.
The Stewarts and their fellow resistance fighters disappeared for a time, returning with a variety of riches.
*
Trina took her time getting to Smith and Cory. She was pregnant, again. Huge and ungainly and quite beautiful.
"Corrigan, do you want to be food for the whales? Do you?"
"It's all right, ma," the boy said, a little of Trina's Penicuikan lilt in his voice.
"No, it's not all right, wee man. You could slip over the side and we'd never even know it. Now you wear a safety line or you don't come on deck. Understand?"
"But Captain van Hoeken has the transmitter putting sound into the water. There won't be any whales around."
Trina glared at Smith, as if he should somehow be ashamed of the transmitters he had suggested the crew cobble together, simple devices powered by a generator which used batteries charged by wind and sun, devices that filled the water with shit noise, squeals and whistles that drove away leech whales and dolphins, now the most dangerous predators in the sea.
"I'd ask you to talk to your son," she said, her voice icy, "but you are clearly lacking as a role model."
She clipped a safety line around the boy's waist and unleashed another glare when he opened his mouth to complain.
Another voice shouted out gleefully. "Momma caught a fish! Cory's on the line!"
Trina marched back the way she had come, scooping up little Tama, who had come into the world two years after Cory.
The little girl had her mother's hair and eyes. She began to shriek at the indignity of being taken belowdecks.
She has her mother's lungs as well, Smith thought.
*
By the time the party had reached the campus along Mayfield road, half of them were riding, after passing by the school of veterinary medicine, now little more than a stable for leech mounts. They had three saddled mules, and another pair mules pulling a wagon that they hoped to fill with supplies. Horses got the bug. Sterile mules did not. No one knew why, but they were grateful to have animal strength on their side. They also had gained an animal steward, a woman of fifty years or so named Siobhan.
"If it wolks on foor legs," she said, "I ken how to care for it."
The Stewarts earlier separation from the party became clear. While Smith had been talking to the old man in the school of Medicine the brothers had been raiding the dusty arms and armor exhibit in the nearby National Museum of Scotland. They had returned with a fine selection of antique weaponry.
No guns, though. Smith was itching for a reliable pair of shooters.
There were weathered signs on the edge of the campus.
School of Geosciences. Grant Institute (Earth Science). British Geological Survey.
Smith looked back. In plain view were the high, sheer cliffs of the Salisbury Crags and the peak of an extinct volcano called Arthur's seat.
Smith let those familiar with the university structure do the talking. By nightfall another pair of leeches had been killed, and a man had been found, a man who could help Smith.
After arranging lookouts to watch for leeches, he and Trina went into a low building, and looked around in wonder.
The man awaiting them was a scientist, alone in a great hall filled with shelves of old knowledge.
Books. Photographs. Charts. In stacks and folios and rolls.
The man was old, but not ancient. He settled his visitors in chairs, and made tea. The tea was terrible, imported from far away and cut with spunkweed, but it was accepted with thanks.
Smith told the scientist his idea. He told the man of an old newspages story he had read, about a island rising up out of the sea. A new land born just as the Pandemic began, over fifty years ago. He said it was west of the South Americas.
The scientist sipped his tea.
"I have guarded the knowledge in this room for half my life. I have gathered it and catalogued it and studied it. I have protected it because this information is the future of our people. There are maps, geological surveys, satellite photos, and much more. This is the future because it is knowledge of the world. This is the face of the world, a face most of us have forgotten."
Smith and Trina saw maps. Some relatively new and bright with color, some old and brittle and faded by time.
"You came so far," Trina said, a finger sliding across one map from the Americas to the Britains.
Smith saw a vast land called Australia, dotted with cities and towns. He had never heard of it, and he briefly wondered what it was like.
They saw detailed surveys of the Britains, the coasts of this great island and smaller islands around it.
They saw pictures taken from beyond the sky, and both he and Trina were struck dumb by the beauty of the earth.
Smith studied one sky picture closely. It was the South Americas.
"Where are these islands?"
The scientist had been turning the pages of a heavy folio, sticking slips of paper between some pages to mark his place.
"From here?" The scientist showed them to a model of the earth on a tarnished metal stand.
Trina had spun the world around and giggled. "I'm the Queen of the Earth," she said.
The scientist had frowned, and planted a finger on the Britains, which seemed very small.
"The islands you seek are on the other side of the globe. Down and across the length and width of the Atlantic, around the Horn, and north again to the Nazca plate, where you will have to hope that another shift in the earth or a volcanic explosion hasn't destroyed these islands. Or hope that they are habitable at all. Or not already claimed." He tapped an area between the North and South Americas. "There was once a passage here, but it could be risky. If it still exists it could be held by leeches and their vassals. I would suggest staying on the open sea."
It was so far to go, the outcome filled with uncertainty.
Smith wasn't surprised. "So nothing is guaranteed?"
The scientist shook his head.
"Well, it's life as usual, then," Smith said.
"No," the scientist replied, "It's the end of the world, as far as you are concerned!"
*
A crewman in the crow's nest of the ship let out a garbled cry. He sounded like a man overjoyed to be strangling on his own tongue.
Smith and Cory looked up.
"It's the French man," Cory said. "Mr. Caul. He's funny."
"That's not the word I would use," Smith said.
Caul was gesturing frantically at the rigging and yelling.
Smith heard 'Luhwahzoh! Luwahzoh!'
Smith cupped his hands and hollered. "Jean! What is it?"
Cory pulled on Smith's shirt sleeve. "Kes-kuh-seh, dad."
Caul shouted, "L'oiseau!"
Smith looked at Cory. Cory shrugged a very Smith-like shrug.
Caul shouted again. "Merde! Les Américains! C'est un oiseau!"
"Oh," Cory said. "A bird. He says it's a bird."
Smith let his hands rest on the guns that were always on his hips. If another seagull shit on him it was going to be shark food. He hated the things.
"Wow," Cory said.
Smith saw it. Just under Caul, and far above the deck, a little bird sat on a taut rope.
It wasn't a sea bird. It was small, and somewhat drab in color. It was a finch. It opened its beak and spoke in music.
*
Two years after Smith and Trina walked out of the scientist's hall with the charts and photographs they needed, he set foot on the deck of the ship he had purchased with a great many diamonds.
The ship was to be stocked with food, water, seeds, six young mules, tools for building and farming, books for learning, microscopes, telescopes, weapons, medicines, small motors, and more. There were also birds and cats on board, and uninvited mice which would one day provide food for the cats.
There would be thirty-five passengers, and fifteen crew. Twenty-two women, six of them crew. 21 men, seven of them crew. Seven children, including the baby Trina carried when she was helped across the gangway and onto the brig.
Smith's party had passed by Newcastle as they had journeyed south.
Gordon Keef was with them, as was his boy Colin. Their big friend Hungee was no more, giving his life in a clash with a leech army on the outskirts of London, the same battle that shattered Smith's leg.
It would be another six months until the ship was ready and the season was right.
They set sail under blue skies.
The twin-masted ship hade been christened 'Hope.'
Three months out they were attacked in the night by Dago pirates flying a leech flag. The fight was fierce. The Stewart boys dropped more than a dozen heads into the water. Smith freed five vassals who agreed to fight for the survivors. The only one to make it through the night alive was the French man, Caul. The pirate ship was raided for usable goods, and then scuttled.
Bad weather stopped them for months at a time.
They encountered more pirates. Dagos and Frenchies. They also came across a quiet nightmare, a drifting ship filled with munchers that moaned and cried out to them as the ships passed.
They were driven east by a storm and stopped to take collect fresh water on the coast of the Dark Continent. They were attacked by a herd of massive beasts with skin the toughness and color of concrete. They lost two crew members.
When they crossed the tail of the South Americas, called Cape Horn, another storm sent them south to a place that was just a field of white on the maps. This was more than three years into the voyage. The Hope was damaged and they found a sheltered cove in that unusual land. There were green temperate zones all along the coast. Further inland was a world of ice.
They stayed on the coast one full year, building homes and considering staying there, but the weather could grow terribly harsh, and the seasoned sailors told Smith that more favorable climates could be found near the line on the maps called the equator.
Eventually the Hope set out to sea again, the deck scattered with clay pots full of flowering plants, moving slowly along the coast of the South Americas. They picked up four women and two men along the way, escapees from leech kingdoms.
The waters here were dotted with islands not to be found on any map. Many were green with vegetation, but too small to support a new community. Many were large enough for their needs, but barren save for grasses and wildflowers. Something big had happened here long ago. Earthquakes. Seaquakes.
There was some good news. Due to the threat of bloodthirsty leech whales, multitudes of fish stayed in shallow waters, close to shore. Fishing was no longer a concern.
The ship eventually moved away from the coast, heading west, then north, seeking the islands Smith had read about before Cory was born.
Nine years had passed since Smith first laid eyes on Trina.
Now all his hopes were centered on a tiny bird.
*
The finch took to the air, flying north.
Caul scanned the sea through a telescope. "Rien!"
Cory had good eyes. Smith liked to think the boy had the eyes of a sharpshooter. Cory's mother liked to think the boy had the eyes of an artist. Smith sent him up alongside Caul.
Cory took the telescope. He looked through it a long time. Finally he looked down, a grin lighting up his face.
"LAND!"
Smith began to dance.
*
There were a series of old satellite pictures showing their destination. One showed an eruption of fire and steam. One showed raw rock and ash. One showed weeds and shrubs taking root as rains nourished wind-borne seeds. The last picture in the series had actually been processed by a leech, years after the Pandemic began. It showed the islands Smith sought. The land was obscured by a veil of mist, but there was green there.
Smith remembered the old scientist arguing that the green might not be the lush vegetation Smith hoped for. It might be shallow waters, indicating the island was more sandbar than anything else.
*
Smith's awkward limp-step dance made Cory laugh so much the boy nearly fell out of the rigging as he descended. The thud of Smith's boots woke more than one tabby sleeping on deck in a patch of warm sunlight. Pint was lying on top of a sealed box that was one of five beehives on board. She was oblivious to Smith's antics, too busy napping. On the deck below her, one of her kittens now fully grown was nursing kittens of her own.
Cory reached the deck just as Trina and Tama and a group of passengers and crew gathered around Smith.
Smith found another telescope and tried to steady himself. The goddamned horizon kept jumping around. He saw it, lost it, dammit! Steady. There it was. Just a glimpse.
An island. A big one. Trees. A beach. A few ridges or small mountains. Green, green, green. Moving specks that might have been birds taking to the air. An island, and more. There were smaller islands as well. It was a chain.
He looked at the compass hanging off of his belt.
The Hope was right on course.
Land.
Smith began to dance again, and hum.
Cory could only stare.
"Mom?"
Smith began to sing. His voice was raw and off key.
"That's great, it starts with an earthquake, birds and snakes, an aeroplane -
Lenny Bruce is not afraid. Eye of a hurricane, listen to yourself churn -
world serves its own needs, don't misserve your own needs..."
Cory looked worried, concerned for his dad. Trina could only laugh. Little Tama ran to her daddy and danced beside him, clapping her hands.
"He's singing, honey. He's singing the survivor's song. I haven't heard that one in years."
"Is dad okay?"
Trina gave Cory a nod. "He's happy, baby. He's finally, truly happy."
As quickly as she could keep up, Trina explained the prophecies of the survivor's song to her son.
In the early days of the Pandemic, a virus first carried by birds and then carried further still by air travelers, the spread of the disease was covered up by the lying snakes in the government. There were earthquakes and hurricanes and other natural disasters that further complicated the human struggle against the sickness that bred leeches. The leeches served only themselves, feeding on the survivors.
Coy asked, "Lenny Bruce?"
"He was a man who laughed in the face of terrible things," Trina said, telling all of it as she had heard it told to her by Smith, who had heard it from others many years before.
Smith kept singing. One of the crew accompanied him on a harmonica.
"Feed it up a knock, speed, grunt no, strength no. Ladder structure clatter with fear of height, down height. Wire in a fire, represent the seven games in a government for hire and a combat site. Left her, wasn't coming in a hurry with the furies breathing down your neck..."
The seven largest industrial nations in the world had first tried to cover up the Pandemic, and as leeches infiltrated the halls of power they enabled the spread of the disease, the feeding frenzy.
"The last part is special to me," Trina said. "When I was taken prisoner by the leech lord—"
"Dork," Cory said with a scowl.
"—Daric, when he took me, everyone I knew was unable or unwilling to help me, stopped by the leeches, or living in fear of them. Until your father came for me."
Another passenger appeared with a battered guitar, strumming madly as Smith sang on. Everyone knew the survivor's song. Everyone found a singularly personal meaning in some of the words.
"Team by team reporters baffled, trump, tethered crop. Look at that low plane! Fine then. Uh oh, overflow, population, common group, but it'll do. Save yourself, serve yourself. World serves its own needs, listen to your heart bleed. Tell me with the rapture and the reverent in the right - right. You vitriolic, patriotic, slam, fight, bright light, feeling pretty psyched...."
The disease continued to spread, the cover-up left people confused and afraid. Those who could afford to fled, by car or plane or boat as the leech population swelled. Society began falling apart. People prayed to their Gods, to no avail, and people began fighting back.
"It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine..."
Now more people were on deck, some singing along. Even those sailors working their shifts were joining in.
"Six o'clock - TV hour. Don't get caught in foreign tower. Slash and burn,
return, listen to yourself churn. Lock him in uniform and book burning,
blood letting. Every motive escalate. Automotive incinerate. Light a candle,
light a motive. Step down, step down. Watch a heel crush, crush..."
As the power wielded by the leeches grew, more and more people began fighting back. Many died, but words of their bravery spread far. It was then, that the resistance was born.
"Uh oh, this means no fear - cavalier. Renegade and steer clear! A tournament, a tournament, a tournament of lies. Offer me solutions, offer me alternatives and I decline..."
Trina watched Smith dancing like a happy fool. "I always thought that part referred to your father."
"It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine... The other night I tripped a nice continental drift divide. Mount St. Edelite. Leonard Bernstein. Leonid Brezhnev, Lenny Bruce and Lester Bangs. Birthday party, cheesecake, jelly bean, boom! You symbiotic, patriotic, slam, but neck, right? Right."
Smith had crossed continents, and seas, and now he was leading all of them to a chain of volcanic islands. Edelite was a mineral found in volcanic vents. The four L's, great men, all dead. The meaning? Life eventually moves on and leaves you behind no matter who you are. You had to learn to take the good with the bad, jelly beans and booms. And unless you continued to fight against the leeches, you were food to them, no matter how much you were convinced the two species could coexist, no matter how loyal you were to their causes and kingdoms and nations. In the end it all came down to two things. Their teeth, and your neck. Which did you want so save?
"It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine..."
Smith finished the song and kept dancing to the rustic music, sweeping Tama into his arms and swinging her around. Others started singing the song again, their voices carrying across the waves.
There was land visible on the horizon now, visible to the naked eye. It was just a green thread, but it was there.
Smith and Trina would not see the final outcome of the battle between survivors and leeches... but their children would.
One day the genes of Cory and Tama and the baby not yet born would spread beyond the confines of the island ahead. Trina and Smith's children were not leech, muncher, or human. They were an entirely new variant, a new species. One that was better and more resilient than anything before, one that would, in time, dilute the leech and muncher virus out of existence.
One day, their children's children would return to the north, on epic voyages of rediscovery.
Smith's long journey was finally coming to an end, yet in a way, it was only just beginning.
The ship sailed north toward the chain of green islands, carrying its precious cargo away from the end of the world and toward the beginning of a new one.
THE END
User Reviews
Submitted by Fey (user info) at 2008-08-11 13:06:00 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by MyNameIsTim (user info) at 2005-12-26 18:26:30 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
phenominal.
Submitted by zakalwe (user info) at 2005-10-07 19:58:45 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Brezhnev a great man? not something I'd expect from you.
excellent ending. saw the "superior kids" thing coming though. Smith as Adam.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-30 09:16:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Bird flu 'could kill 150 million'
From: Reuters
By Irwin Arieff in New York
September 30, 2005
A GLOBAL flu pandemic could kill as many as 150 million people if the world fails to prepare for an expected MUTATION of the bird flu virus enabling it to spread from human to human, the United Nations said.
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,16769376-2,00.html
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-30 09:13:41 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Bird flu — the coming pandemic
http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/cover_stories/article_1875.asp
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-30 09:13:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
It's coming...
Submitted by Phinch (user info) at 2005-09-20 13:44:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by jack11058 (user info) at 2005-09-15 12:17:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
well
fucking
done
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-09 14:40:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by hcp28 (user info) at 2005-09-08 08:22:39 (#)
Ranking: 2
come on jack where is the next series starter?
-
http://www.ubersite.com/m/74452
Submitted by hcp28 (user info) at 2005-09-08 08:22:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
come on jack where is the next series starter?
Submitted by Mop (user info) at 2005-09-06 17:15:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
A fitting end to a fine series. Very curious as to the nature of your aforementioned next open-series-thingy.
Submitted by hcp28 (user info) at 2005-09-03 15:40:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I'm sad that the series is over. I really grew to like smith. What a great run.
Submitted by iradney (user info) at 2005-09-03 06:09:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
brilliant! absolutely gripping!
Submitted by nrduncan (user info) at 2005-09-02 10:56:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Awesome. Too bad it's over. Nice wrap up though.
I look forward to your future writing.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-02 09:13:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:55:20 (#)
Ranking: 2
I thought you 'explained' too many verses of that REM song, though...it was a bit overkill to me.
--
Agreed, but the alternatives would have created too much nit-picker fodder. Besides, it was kinda fun.
Submitted by HadToBeDone (user info) at 2005-09-02 07:40:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
You're only allowed to start another multi-poster series if I can find a way to work emus into it. Somehow leech emus just didn't work out for me....
Submitted by Benny (user info) at 2005-09-02 02:26:23 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
A brilliant end to a brilliant series. It's nice that Smith got his happy ending (Lord knows you tried to kill him a couple of times). I'm looking forward to the next multi-author series. So far you've been very vague. I believe you said it's something about a hole?
I have another post written for ATP which I will be put up later today.
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-09-02 00:38:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:56:32 (#)
Ranking: 0
Tomorrow.
Note to TheCaes. Take advantage of that cheap Canadian healthcare are get some valium. This one might get you going and get you pissed at me at the same time....
*******************
Note to The Jack. You're lucky I live in Canada instead of the States because if I did I'd take advantage of the lax gun control laws and shoot your ass dead. Well, maybe not dead. But I do feel a wounding is in order.
I'll probably sit this one out, Jack, as I am still not finished choking out the giganctic beast of a series your last little experiment wrought. But who knows, I might take a crack at one post, depending on what you've got up your sleeve...
...ONE POST.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:57:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by HadToBeDone (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:18:06 (#)
Ranking: 2
I knew you were secretly in love with Caul...
--
I was keeping it a secret?
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:56:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Submitted by horse87 (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:16:47 (#)
Ranking: 2
Great finale.
(Nice to see Caul in there as well."Luhwahzoh".. Hilarious...)
So.......
When are you gonna post that next 'multiple author' idea you've been telling me about?
--
Tomorrow.
Note to TheCaes. Take advantage of that cheap Canadian healthcare are get some valium. This one might get you going and get you pissed at me at the same time....
Submitted by tlozoot (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:56:09 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Wow. Thank you.
Submitted by thecaes (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:55:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Ha ha ha -- Caul.
Great ending, Jack. I really like the way you tied all this up.
I thought you 'explained' too many verses of that REM song, though...it was a bit overkill to me.
Thanks for a great series, dude.
Submitted by LadyPlural (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:30:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by HadToBeDone (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:18:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I knew you were secretly in love with Caul...
Submitted by horse87 (user info) at 2005-09-01 23:16:47 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Great finale.
(Nice to see Caul in there as well."Luhwahzoh".. Hilarious...)
So.......
When are you gonna post that next 'multiple author' idea you've been telling me about?
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2005-09-01 22:21:58 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Fuck me, Bart needs to somehow make the rank box lock.
Submitted by joedaddy (user info) at 2005-09-01 22:10:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
Ok ok, good post, no hits, yadayada, what else is new.
Now....my question is:
Where did all the LordofthePosts/Anansies/Silverwolfs/Taks/Lanas and Phinchs(nevermindjustsawhim)
etc/ etc.......Go?
I've, obviously, been reading the archives, and
I know they went somewhere, and....... I want to go there too!
Jack11..,you and a couple of others aren't enough for me, and I Know there's another forum somewhere
Link up a brother.
Joe
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-01 22:02:21 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
140 hits... 8 reviews... hmmm...
Submitted by Caulaincourt (user info) at 2005-09-01 19:14:24 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
It's the first time I click on one of those and I see my name. I don't have to read it though.
Luhwahzoh!
Submitted by Bubba2341 (user info) at 2005-09-01 19:07:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
GREAT!!
Jack, like I said on your last post, try the literary agent route
to get your stuff published. Anyone who writes this well probably
has a plethora of stories stacked in the hall closet just waiting
to be read. Go for it. And good luck!
Submitted by DavyJones (user info) at 2005-09-01 18:45:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by ArtificialInsanity (user info) at 2005-09-01 18:42:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Damn good series.
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2005-09-01 18:06:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
wow, you stated this in April - good job, man!
Submitted by Yes (user info) at 2005-09-01 17:53:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Thank you. This was an awesome read.
When are you having my babies damnit?! HUZZAH!
Submitted by cuberat (user info) at 2005-09-01 17:22:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Well Written.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-01 17:21:36 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Btw the way, those islands aren't real. The whole thing is a photoshop that took me a shitload of time.
Submitted by William_Q_Percy (user info) at 2005-09-01 17:14:39 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Bravo.
Submitted by Jack_McCallum (user info) at 2005-09-01 17:13:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
Godspeed, Mr. Smith.
It was nice knowing you!